


The Mysterious Illness of Reprobate

by Androids_in_Metropolis



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Family, Fill, Fluff, Gen, OT5 Friendship, Prompt Fic, Puberty
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-24
Updated: 2015-05-24
Packaged: 2018-04-01 02:18:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,626
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4002112
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Androids_in_Metropolis/pseuds/Androids_in_Metropolis
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Liam doesn't know what's going on with him lately, all the moods and the feelings...no one told him this would happen.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Mysterious Illness of Reprobate

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Emily](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Emily/gifts).



> For Emily-I hope you like this little thing. Sorry it took so long, I had a lot going at the time. Please read and Review, loves:)

Liam woke one morning, his throat feeling scratchy and the sun pouring through his open window. It was late, and he knew it. He also knew that they had work that day, and that the other boys would be waiting for him to get up and moving, but at that moment he couldn’t care less. All he wanted was to stay in bed, and listen to some music. He could read a book he had been meaning to start, or, you know, just sleep. The last idea he fancied most at the moment, and so it was the one he chose, laying back down and pulling the blankets over his head to allow for darkness and to keep the sound of the other boys stomping around out of his head.

“Liam! Wake up!” He heard someone call, just before he felt a weight on his chest. He couldn’t have been asleep for more than a few minutes...it felt like it had been no time at all since he had closed his eyes and let himself fall away from the world. “Liam, get out of the damn bed,” the voice shouted close to his ear.

Liam didn’t listen, instead turning with some effort, and tipping whoever was on his chest roughly onto the floor. He heard a grunt and some dirty words before the person, Louis, he assumed, grabbed the blankets off him and glared down at him as he sat up, angry and prepared to bitch. 

“Why the bloody fuck would you do that?” Liam shouted, grabbing his blankets back from a somewhat shocked looking Louis. Liam was proud of his guess work, but he didn't have time to grin to himself before his covers were yanked off again and Louis’ eyes were glaring down at him, his lips moving to form words like ‘lazy’, ‘school’, ‘commitment’ and ‘ass’. 

“Get out of bed, Liam!” Louis said, venom in his voice. Where did this kid get off thinking he could skip school, practice, and meeting just ‘cause he felt like it? He was being an ass, and while Louis knew it was probably just his age, it didn’t annoy him any less. “Now!” he ordered harshly as he noted that Liam hadn’t even moved a centimeter since he had last asked him to get up. The younger boy quickly jumped into action, pulling on his clothes from beside the bed and stomping. He glared at Louis, who glowered in return. He so wasn’t in the mood for this. 

“Happy?” Liam asked impertinently, his shirt buttoned wrong and his tie hanging lopsided and hardly tied. He knew his hair must have been a mess...He wondered if he was really going at Louis too hard, but the little annoyed voice in his had told him he was doing fine as and that Louis deserved it...but did he really? It had to be hard being the oldest in a house of just boys. Liam found himself subconsciously fidgeting under the other man’s gaze, fixing his tie and looking at his socked toes. 

“Just ecstatic,” Louis replied sourly, looking the other boy over. He wondered what Liam was thinking, why he was acting like he was. Was there something wrong? Louis thought that Liam was a sweet kid-Surely he wouldn’t just piss him off for no reason, right? Shaking his head he looked up, “Go get your shoes on, we have to go.” 

Liam did as he was told, tied out again and wondering why he had put up a fight in the first place. Of course Louis was right-He had obligations, why was he just brushing them off? He wasn’t that stupid. He knew when he had to do something, and where to draw the lines. He hoped he wouldn’t go off again, wouldn’t just screw everyone over when he felt like it. He didn’t want to be that kind of person. He wasn’t that kind of person, right?

\-----------

Zayn saw Liam getting toast and went over to ask him why he hadn’t been up earlier, but as soon as the words left his mouth he knew he should have left well enough alone. Liam dropped the toast, and stopped out of the kitchen, leaving Zayn wondering what he had done wrong. 

“Was that Liam?” Niall asked, looking over his shoulder as he walked into the kitchen, grabbing an apple and leaning against the counter. “He’s got a stick up his ass this mornin’, man,” Niall laughed as Zayn nodded an affirmative to his question. 

\-----------

Liam waited in the car, massaging his forehead with his palms. Why was he acting like this? Why was his voice coming out squeaky? Why did he just want to stay in bed all day, and lastly, why did he want to kiss the next attractive human to come his way? He didn’t know the answer to any of the questions he was asking himself, and that just made him more upset with both himself and everyone around him. As the other boys got quietly into the car they went on their way it didn’t get better, and by the time they had gotten home that night he positively despised everything and everyone. Life sucked. 

As if to add a cherry to his metaphorical ice cream sunday of seeming misfortune he had strange dreams that night. They weren’t friendly dreams, nor were they nightmares per say, but it left him hot and sticky all over. He could feel fingers running up his back and in between his legs and though the person he was within his dream had no face, nor any physical attributes (no breasts, no balls...nothing but a dark silhouette) he felt like he knew them, and he banged his lips against theirs just as he felt himself being woken. 

Zayn was blushing as he woke his friend up, not wanting to acknowledge what was going on. He saw Liam come to and notice what was happening, his pale face turning newfound shades of red and pink. He looked positively sick to his stomach with embarrassment and Zayn gave him a weak smile and told him to go clean himself up. Liam nodded, and Zayn left the room, still blushing himself. So that was what had been going on lately...a dreaded little thing called ‘puberty’. 

Zayn braced himself for another hellish day, at least knowing why Liam was acting the way he was. That knowledge didn’t make it much better though. 

\----------------

Liam didn’t know what was happening to him, and he didn’t know why it was happening either. No one had ever said to watch out for these things that was setting him off lately-Was he going crazy? Why weren’t the other band members saying anything about it? He wished he could ask someone the questions he was dying to ask, but he didn’t know what words to use...or even who to ask. There wasn’t a class on ‘flapping your mouth’ at his college, nor was there one on ‘strange dreams that make stranger things happen’. All in all he was getting very stressed out, and the long hours he was working didn’t help either. 

Several months after the strange behavior began it was still going strong, and Liam was feeling helpless. He woke up, went to school, snapped at several people or was too sweet to them, he stayed up too late though he was tired, he hated sleeping in case he had the same dream he had had when Zayn woke him. He hated work because he was so tired. 

One night he couldn’t take it any longer, and he found himself crying, and crying quite hard. It wasn’t the type of girlish crying that you could hide behind some sunglasses and a cool pack. It was the kind of snotty, choking crying of an over excited child. That day he locked himself in his room, not coming out even when Louis angrily knocked on his door, telling him to get his ass out of bed already and unlock the bloody door. 

Needless to say, the next morning was awful, filled with glares, unwanted questions, and puffy eyes. The other’s could see something was up-Even Harry noticed. Harry was normally pretty out of it, happy to chase dreams and bits of fluff, but it was hard to be happy around Liam these days, no matter how hard he tried. Louis watched Liam carefully, asking Zayn to do the same. It looked like things were getting worse, and Louis wondered what was going on inside Liam’s head. He didn’t ask though, remembering that when he was younger he wouldn’t want to be asked either. Instead he settled on keeping a close eye on him at all times, making sure there were no cuts where there shouldn’t be, and checking for bruises from hands not his own. 

Liam went for longer and longer periods without laughing, or even smiling, and it slowly began to wear everyone down. When he was happy he was almost too happy, seeming like a high butterfly, and that was almost worse than being sad. Things he had liked now seemed to displease him, and when Harry had brought it up one day Louis got a call from the college saying that Liam had been in a fist fight and he needed to be picked up, along with Harry. 

When Louis had gotten to the school he found out that Liam had beaten the crap out of the youngest boy, and that Harry had a black eyes and bruises all over. Louis had never come so close to hitting Liam as he did when he picked up, hugging Harry as soon as he saw him, and then turning to Liam who was looking at his sneakers indifferently. 

“We need to talk,” Louis said angrily, guiding a confused Harry to the car, and pulling Liam behind him. 

\-------------------  
Liam cried that night, Louis holding him against his chest as the younger tried to explain what was going on. Louis didn’t understand how Liam, at a full 16 years old didn’t know what was going on yet. Harry watched them curiously from the kitchen table as Zayn tried to fix up some of the cuts and bruises. 

The whole story slowly came out, between shuddering gasps. Liam was crying too hard to be able to explain anything quickly, and each sentence seemed to drag on. 

He had hit Harry because he had had been bothering him all day, asking him over and over what the matter was. Apparently Liam had just snapped, pummeling the smaller boy until interrupted by a teacher, who dragged them unceremoniously apart. 

Zayn and Louis listened in shock as Liam explained that he was upset because he kept feeling strange, and his voice went all funny at inopportune moments. He didn’t like the fact that he wanted to stay up later, but since he had so much work he had to get up early too. He didn’t like the fact that he wanted to cry sometimes, but couldn’t because he was at school or in an office or with the other boys, and he didn’t like the fact that he had no idea what was wrong with him at all. 

“Should I go to hospital?” Liam asked, looking through his eyelashes up at Louis. Zayn couldn’t help but laugh from the other side of the table, choking a little on the soda he had previously been drinking through a straw with Harry. 

“No, love, you should just talk about it with us,” the dark haired male laughed, his chest rising and falling quickly. “Li, you’re just going through puberty,” Zayn explained, standing up and going over to where the other two were sitting, running his hand gently through Liam’s hair. “Didn’t anyone ever tell you this would happen?” Zayn couldn’t believe Liam was as old as he was, and still didn’t understand what was going on with his body and mind. Zayn himself had been raised in a relatively conservative and sensible house, and he had know all about this kind of thing by the time he was 12. He had just sat down with his mum and they had just asked each other questions, talking until he understood. 

“No,” Liam murmured, feeling stupid. It seemed like everyone in the room knew what was going on except for him. Even Harry looked on knowingly, and while they were the same age, Harry was always the baby. He always got clued in last, but this time it was Liam’s turn. 

Louis sighed, not even knowing where to begin, and instead opting to ask Zayn to grab his laptop so they could watch some videos on the pesky subject. Once it was clear that Liam understood what was going on Louis hugged him, and whispered into his hair. 

“You see? The only thing wrong with you was your attitude...now, go apologize to Harry and we’ll have spaghetti for dinner,” Louis whispered, feeling as if Liam was 6 instead of 16. Liam happily walked off, as blushingly he apologized to Harry and then went back to the kitchen to help prepare his favourite meal. He was glad to hear that nothing was really wrong with him, even though he hardly believed it at the moment; The time he had spent feeling alone had taken a toll on him, and his attitude towards life. He thought he did need to sleep more, and as he chopped vegetables for the sauce he talked to Louis and Zayn about it until they had a somewhat sound plan to combat the overachieving, tired teen’s dilemma. 

“So, we’ll take a week off,” Zayn said decidedly, dropping the pasta into the boiling water with a pinch of salt. “You, Harry, and Niall will leave school for the week, Louis and I will work it out with managment and we’ll just stay in,” he continued, stirring the bubbling pot. “We’ll watch movies and talk, the kind of stuff we used to do.” 

Liam smiled softly-They were really watching out for him, and he was lucky to have them. Zayn and Louis had a knack for being able to make situations that to him felt dier-The miss-mosh of feelings that Liam had been feeling for the past several weeks seemed to be so simple now. He wasn’ different, or suffering through some rare disease. He was just living, and as Louis had explained, it got better and if he could learn now, it was all easily solvable. 

“Sleep more, sleep in, skip school now and then-It’s simple really,” Louis had said, and now as they ate dinner it all made sense. Liam had been under so much (mostly self imposed) stress lately that he had forgotten to just laugh with his friends, or play hooky at the park. He had forgotten how good it felt to get away with it. 

The next week seemed to be the most relaxing he had ever had, and now it seemed so simple. It was all ‘Who’s touching me foot?’ and ‘Get off the remote!’ No one was beaten up, and no one cried from any malady apart from laughter. There were a few moans and groans, like, ‘Do we have to watch Edward Scissorhands again, Ni?’ and ‘Pizza over power!’ but other than that, it was just as soft as you could make the real world be. 

Louis and Zayn took special care of Liam, even after the week was up, talking to him, and sometimes getting the other two involved so they would all understand what was going on. There would never be another case of ‘The Mysterious Illness of Reprobate’ if they had anything to do with it-In other words, ‘Puberty’s a thing.’


End file.
